2016 legislature budget recap by VP Kalbert Young

Kalbert Young, UH vice president for budget and finance and chief financial officer, shares his analysis of the 2016 legislative session.

May 5 was the final day of the 2016 legislative regular session. The legislature adjourned passing hundreds of bills—some of which were of interest or concern to the university. Of course, the most significant of these is the supplemental budget for the State of Hawaiʻi.

The University of Hawaiʻi worked very hard with a number of lawmakers to advance the university’s needs and priorities.

The supplemental budget bill has been passed by the legislature and now moves to the governor for his approval. Barring any unlikely veto of budget items by the governor, let’s take a look at how the University of Hawaiʻi is represented for funding in the budget. Below is a comparison of the items requested by the Board of Regents back in January versus what was included in the budget bill for the university.

Operating Budget Proposals

Campus

UH Request

Conference Draft

UHM

4 positions and $350,000 for CTAHR Extension Program

4 positions and $330,000 for CTAHR Extension Program

UHM

$306,168 for Office of Research Compliance

None

UHM

$1,093,832 for Environmental Health and Safety Office

None

UHM

$5,000,000 for UH Cancer Center

None

UHM

$3,000,000 for UHM athletics

None

$3,000,000 appropriated to UH System for systemwide athletics

UHH

$560,000 for UHH athletics

None

UHH

37 positions and $420,000 for security services

27 positions and $0 for security services

UHWO

12 positions and $728,020 for continued growth and evolution of UHWO

6 positions and $357,604

UHCC

$1,250,000 for a centralized equipment fund

$1,250,000 for a centralized equipment fund

System

20 positions and $3,500,000 for Hawaiʻi Research and Innovation Initiative

None

UHM

Transfer positions and funds from UH System to all campuses for program support

Transfer 1 position from UH System to UHM and $95,000 for assistant professor

UHM

$350,000 non-recurring for theatre and dance

System

$150,000 non-recurring for the Hawaiʻi State Science Fair

System

$3,000,000 for athletics

Over the course of the past 5 months, there has been much media coverage about some of the key funding priorities of the university. Deferred maintenance is a major capital concern and UH had asked for $184.9 million in general obligation bond funds to support a capital campaign for deferred maintenance for the next fiscal year. The state budget contains a total of $182.75 million worth of general obligation bond appropriation for specific project funding and $30 million in revenue bonds. This represents significant progress in public and university funding towards deferred capital needs throughout the UH System.

UH Capital Budget Comparison

Campus

UUH Request

Conference Draft

UHM

$2,500,000 for design of Snyder Hall

$55,000,000 for a new Life Sciences Building to replace Snyder Hall that includes $20,000,000 from a current appropriation

$9,000,000 for North Hawaiʻi Education and Research Center (HawaiʻiCC)

UHCC

$300,000 for additional office space and storage at Pālamanui (HawaiʻiCC)

UHCC

$7,000,000 for Maui Food Innovation Center (Maui College)

The University of Hawaiʻi is grateful and appreciative of the support that the legislature has provided this session—especially in providing resources to make progress on our decades-old deferred maintenance backlog. Much more work will need to be done and future funding support will continue to be needed. We look forward to continuing to improve our partnership and to work together as a community to improve and better our state’s only public university system.

The budget bill is expected to be signed by the governor before the start of the next fiscal year which begins on July 1, 2016.

I would like to know why you REQUESTED that deferred maintenance funds be restricted from the College of Education? .. funds “shall not be expended for the college of education if the college of education remains at the University of Hawaii at Manoa” section 51.3 of HB1700. This agenda ought to be made public.

We checked with VP Kalbert Young and he sent us the following response.

Provisos in the state budget are purely the intent of state legislators and Hawaiʻi state departments, including the University of Hawaiʻi, are not part of the process of negotiating provisos. The UH leadership team did not work on this proviso or was aware of it.

However, now that the budget bill has been passed by the legislature, the university will have to explore what avenues exist to fund whatever projects are necessary to fund while adhering to the legal requirements and intents of the legislature.